January 23, 2025

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Albermarle to expand Nevada lithium production | Automotive Industry News

Albemarle is to develop ability at the company’s lithium manufacturing facility in Silver Peak, Nevada and start out a programme to appraise clays and other out there State resources for commercial manufacturing of lithium.

The company says as world-wide desire for electric powered autos grows, North American automotive companies are trying to get to regionalise their offer chain for increased stability and sustainability.

Albemarle’s financial commitment in Silver Peak, which provides lithium from brine extracted from the Clayton Valley basin, will assistance this improved desire for domestic offer of lithium.

Commencing this calendar year, the company programs to invest US$30m to US$50m to double latest manufacturing at the Nevada site by 2025, earning entire use of its brine drinking water legal rights. Moreover, in 2021 the company plans to start off exploration of clay and appraise technological innovation, which could speed up the viability of lithium manufacturing from clay assets in the location. 

“As a leader in the lithium industry, our priority is to optimise our assets and manufacturing,” claimed Albemarle president, Lithium, Eric Norris.

“This includes Silver Peak, a site positioned as the only lithium-producing useful resource in the United States. “This financial commitment in domestic ability shows we are committed to seeking at the numerous methods in which Silver Peak can give domestic assistance for the expanding EV industry.”

In addition to inspecting clay assets, Albemarle is trying to get methods to optimise lithium extraction from its brine assets, which includes people in the Clayton Valley. By a Department of Power-sponsored research venture with Argonne National Laboratory, the company is investigating a process to streamline manufacturing of lithium hydroxide, which is principally utilized in EV batteries, from brine assets.

Albemarle’s domestic assets also contain the 800-acre Kings Mountain, North Carolina, lithium site, which the provider notes, is one of the richest spodumene ore deposits in the environment and household to the company’s world-wide lithium technical centre and piloting functions, as effectively as lithium-made up of brines in Arkansas.